Sarus crane conservation

Link
Amidst al the doom and gloom about wildlife and the dwindling numbers of so many species, form fogs the world over, to rhino, lions and South American primates, it is nice to find a story that has a more positive message.

According to the Thai Society for the Conservation of Wild Animals the Sarus crane in Thailand had been extinct for at least twenty years. The government Office of Natural Resources and Environmental Policy and Planning (ONEP) goes further and states that it disappeared from its natural habitat in Thailand 50 years ago.

Efforts by conservation groups, including the Eastern Sarus Crane Reintroduction Project, under the Zoological Park Organization(ZPO), with the Royal Patronage of H. M. the King of Thailand have made the all-important start to reversing the situation.

The ZPO has successfully bred sarus cranes through artificial insemination and ten chicks have been prodcued. A story in the Bangkok English newspaper of 2nd August quotes ZPO director Pimook Simaroj as saying that the chicks have been released into the wild and in a related story The Sarus Crane Reintroduction Project Thailand have posted a Youtube video that shows a radio collar device being fitted to one of the birds before release. The ZPO and the Thai Department of Natural Parks, Wildlife, and Plant Conservation (DNP) plan to release more cranes.

If the survival rate is satisfactory, the DNP will discuss with related authorities to withdraw sarus crane out of the extinction, but as Nisakorn Kositratna, ONEP's secretary-general said “it may take more time before the cranes can be taken off the extinction list.” That's because the freed cranes were bred in captivity and a species can be removed from the list only after it successfully breeds in nature and its wild population grows.


In neighbouring Cambodia a new Sarus Crane reserve was created on 6 Jan this year, although it did take 5 years for the consultative and bureaucratic process to be completed. According to a report on the website

“In March 2010 the site held over 270 Sarus Cranes, more than 30% of the global population”

The sarus crane, in all its grey glory and red head, is indeed majestic. I got this picture of a pair when I traveled in India a twenty-five years ago. It is the tallest of the cranes at about 150 cm and was originally given the romantic name of Antigone antigone by Karl Linnaeus, the father of modern taxonomy.

Quite why he chose the double barrel is a bit of a mystery, but I speculate that it was because the bird was believed to be truly monogamous. Not just monogamous, but also according to myth, so faithful that if one partner died the other would pine way and die. If I am right this was a reference to Oedipus’s daughter and heroine of Sophocles’s play who was unable to control her emotions on the death of her brother Polyneices and Linnaeus is bound to have had a classical education.

The name was later changed to Grus antigone to more neatly, but very prosaically, fit it into the crane family in general, a group that includes the very common Sandhill crane, the Whooping crane that nests in northern Canada and is even more endangered than the sarus, and several others.

These birds once ranged across southeast Asia, as far west as parts of India and Sri Lanka and even into northern Australia and are generally divided into subspecies according to the area in which they live.

Let’s keep our fingers crossed for this beautiful bird and the efforts of the dedicated people who are trying to keep it, and its habitat, in a viable state.

New book

Link

I’ve been “off air” for just over a year as I worked hard on my new manuscript and found that I could not devote enough time to it and do a decent job with my blogging. The manuscript is now in the hands of a publisher and so I cannot do anything with it for now, so I’m going to try & get back on track. Meanwhile fingers crossed.

Here is the cover that I propose, but of course that may change. It is a single frame converted to digital from a Super8 movie that I shot in the late 1970s, so is a bit grainy.

The image also appears as part of a Youtube video that I posted a few weeks ago. You can find it on my web site under the video link or go straight to it. Here is the link
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qugw7JA1cJw

I will continue to post about conservation issues, with an emphasis on Africa, but there are other things that catch my eye.

Three cups of tea

Linkwww.ikat.org
I have just finished an amazing book called Three Cups of Tea. It is written by Greg Mortensen and David Oliver Relin and tells the story of how Mortensen has led a fantastic program in Pakistan and later Afghanistan, to educate thousands of children, boys and girls equally, through his personal initiatives to build schools in remote regions. The story is compelling and one cannot fail to be moved by it.
Of course this blog is mainly about conservation, and at first the book would not seem to have much to do with the subject, but ultimately it is only though education that we can hope to achieve any kind of balance. Mortensen has, in my opinion, achieved more than all the wars that one can imagine. It seems appropriate to send this post on the very day of the announcement of an additional 30,000 troops are destined to be sent to a country that has never, in all its history since Alexander the Great, been conquered.

Wildlife in Kashmir

Linkhttp://wdin.blogspot.com/

Once upon a time (this is not really a fairy story) Kashmir was one of the great places to visit. During the era of the British Raj it was a major tourist destination and for the avid fisherman the state offered some of the very best fishing in the world. It has been assort of pipe-dream for me to dip a line in those waters, but for twenty or more years it has been no more than a pipe-dream as Kashmir is also the core of the long-standing border dispute between India and Pakistan.

There is one possible benefit to the near-war status of the region where it is estimated that since the 1989 full-blown rebellion against Indian rule blew up over 47,000 people have been killed. Hunters and poachers have hardly dared to set foot in the region.

If two recent reports are anything to go by wildlife in general and Himalayan black bears in particular may have had some measure of protection.

In a Reuters report of Nov 17th by Sheikh Mushtaq that you can find here it seems as if several wildlife species have shown marked increases in population size. Mushtaq quotes Kashmir's wildlife warden, Rashid Naqash as stating that

“Rare birds like the black partridge and pheasant have increased in thousands while more Asiatic black bear, leopards, musk deer and hangul, a rare red deer, now roam the disputed Himalayan region's pine forests.”

Most spectacular is the claim that the population of black bears has jumped from 700-800 to something over 2,500 in twenty years. This would mean that the population has increased by 7% a year.
A more focused report available here comes from Yahoo news and also quotes Rashid Naqash. In this case he is reported to have said that only 300 of the bears inhabit the region. He also told the reporter that three bears have been fitted with GPS collars and that three more are to be collared soon.

"This is the first time in India that Himalayan black bears have been fitted with a GPS collar."

Naqash is also quoted as saying that the collars could also help prevent bear attacks in the region, which are certainly a serious threat to the local villagers. Wild bears have killed more than two dozen people in the past four years and left 150 injured. For those who love nature stories told with the utmost skill this account is very reminiscent of the wonderful stories of naturalist Jim Corbett. If you don’t know them, try & find one such as Maneaters of Kumaon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man-Eaters_of_Kumaon) and give it a read. I was hooked at once and have all his writings.

Naqash also made a claim that seems to be more hope than reality when he stated

"We can always monitor their movements and sound an alert once they start moving towards the human habitations."

While three, or even six bears may be monitored, what about the 294 others or, if
Mushtaq’s numbers are to be believed it would be another 2494!

Something seems to smack of the fairy story element, or maybe the editors have made a mess of what would seem to be an encouraging report.

Water wars Mt. Kenya

Linkhttp://translate.google.ca/translate?hl=en&sl=it&u=http://www.meruherbs.eu/&ei=0rTMSeTgOYnKtQPD5ty5Cg&sa=X&oi=translate&resnum=10&ct=result&prev=/search%3Fq%3DMeru%2BHerbs%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG

I have read on many occasions that the next major war in Africa will be over water. We have just witnessed what may be an early skirmish in this regard.

Several rivers on Mt. Kenya that once used to feed the Uaso Nyiro have gone dry by the time they reach the Laikipia plains. Not surprisingly the ranchers and farmers who run livestock in the lower reaches are upset. Most assume that the water is being taken off higher up by people who tap into the resource for watering the numerous flower and vegetable growing operations on the mountain slopes. In fact some, often most, of the water is taken by riparian landowners needing water for their families or own stock. They usually do this illegally and without permits from the water board.

High up on the mountain slopes, at about 14,000 feet, two major rivers are being tapped in a novel fashion. Someone has employed gangs of labourers to dig trenches and lay pipes right at the springs. Here, the trench meets the stream about 100 metres below the spring. This photo shows a section of pipe in the new trench. Water that used to flow down the rivers has disappeared or has been reduced to the merest trickle. New landowners who have been sold plots that include irrigation in formerly dry areas now supplied by the stolen water are of course well satisfied. In one case government staff broke up the pipes and trenches, but there were repaired within days.

It looks very much as if the Kazita river, a major source for thousands of farmers in Meru district will be the next to be raided. I have fished the Kazita for trout on many occasions, and wonder what will happen.

It is not just these two rivers. The Kithino River, on Mt. Kenya’s western slopes, provides water to 1200 families in one well-run scheme in Tharaka District. The Meru Herbs project, funded initially through Italian initiatives, has well-developed markets in many European countries as well as Japan. If their water source dries up the scheme will collapse.

Solar TV show in Uganda

Linkhttp://www.uwa.or.ug/about.html

Back in February I described the official opening of the new solar unit that we had donated to the little primary school at Kasenyi in Queen Elizabeth National Park, Uganda. Like a daft idiot I got so tied up in the show & the reaction of the children that I failed to take pictures of the event, other that the ribbon cutting by Dr. Jo Haigh & Dr. Margaret Driciru, who is in charge of research and monitoring in the park,. and was acting chief warden that day.
Here are some shots that i missed that day (taken by Jo). First, the gifts that we gave the children, an exercise book, pencil and teddy bear or other toy for the older children, then the speeches by various officials, first Margaret and then Wilson, the Community Conservation warden, then drinks and lunch for everyone who could be fitted into the classroom, and finally, the actual TV working.
All the staff, including Kiiza George, the headmaster, were delighted with the show, and if you take a close look at the last picture you will see that Jo pressed the shutter at exactly the right moment to show the head of a hippo. I had chosen to show a DVD about fisheries conservation and the importance of not killing hippos as they are the keystone species in the lakes of Africa's heartland. Wilson and Margaret are keen to get copies of the video, as it is a great example of the sort of thing that gives a powerful message for all.

Visit to a Chimp Sanctuary

Linkhttp://www.ngambaisland.org/, http://www.vwb-vsf.ca/, http://www.pfizer.ca/english/our%20products/animal%20health/default.asp?s=1

After six days of Internet-free life we are back in circulation. I am writing this from the solar-powered office of Dr. Lawrence Mugisha, who is chief veterinarian and sanctuary manager at Ngamba Island, where forty-five chimpanzees rescued from poachers live out their artificial lives. Here are two of the group next to an artificial termite mound

It is a chilling thought that almost all of these chimps are by-products of the bushmeat trade, as are all the other in the several sanctuaries scattered across Africa from Senegal to Johannesburg in the Pan African Sanctuary Association.

This morning our students have been afforded the privilege of working on health-checks of chimps during the routine annual health-checks of the group.

Lawrence and his team do a thorough work-up and most important they make sure that each adult female has retained her birth-control implant. The island, about a two-hour boat ride from Entebbe, is only one square kilometre in area, which is about enough for one chimp, so the animals have to be intensively managed and their entire food supply comes from their four daily feedings supplied by the dedicated staff.

We were, through the generosity of Pfizer Animal Health and the Canadian branch of Vets Without Borders/ Vétérinarians Sans Frontieres some of the essential supplies and pharmaceuticals that are needed to help make this program a success. Pictured here is Dr. Mushiga with some of our Canadian students and a packet of the drugs used to reverse the effects of the immobilizing drugs that are needed to carry out this work.

Most exciting, I discovered from Dr. Mugisha that a serious look is being taken at the possibility of rehabilitating some chimps back into the wild. A small section of suitable forest has been found in the Labongo area of Western Uganda and teams of investigators are currently taking a hard look at the many components that will need to mesh to make this effort got forward. It will take some time, so maybe there will be something to report next year if things go well.

Just before the boat left for the return to Entebbe we watched as the chimps were given their 2.30 pm feed.

Students in Uganda and Solar Techoloogy

Linkhttp://www.ultratecworld.com/

The students crew for the 2009 Uganda Wildlife Rotation of the 4th year class from the Western College of Veterinary Medicine arive at Entebbe Aiport safe and sound last night and within the hour had reached the dormitory where they will spend the next 3 nights. After a 36 hour journey they did not stay awake for long.

This morning we headed out for money exchange at a local Forex Buraeu and then headed for the offices of Ultratec where Abhay Shah showed the students what he had designed for the Kasneyi Primary School in Queen Elizabeth National Park. The basis is a solar system that will support 3 hours of playing time for DVDs of Vidoetapes, and four low-energy light bulbs. We also had to be pragmatic, and realize, as Abhay stated, that this would also become the local spot for cell phone charging. Unless you have seen it, you will not believe the extent of usage of cell phones in this part of the world.

If we can arrange it we hope to have an offical hand-over and will make sure to have some photos, including one or two that we took today, but cannot post.

We plan to be in Kasenyi when the installation takes place and will certainly take pictures, but of course with the snail pace Internet we will not be able to post them. The most fascinating news concerend the technician who will do the installation. His name is Robert, and he was orphaned at an early age, subsequently supported in a program like the one we are engaged in, and managed to get to technical school and end up installing units all over the country like the one we have purcashed.

His wheel has come full circle.

Solar technology & TV/Video in QEP

Cannot find a high-speed dialup service here, so no chance of photos.
However we have had a productive two days.

It started with a visit to a solar tech company called Ultratech, where Abhay Shah is the director. We discussed the pros and cons of several solar set-ups and agreed that his team would build a system for us at Kasenyi Primary School in Queen Elizabeth National Park, on the shores of Lake George. We plan to install a system that will run four low energy light bulbs, a 32" LCD television, and a DVD/Tape deck that can play either PAL of Europe or VHS of North America. As Abhay pointed out we also need to tell the headmaster, Kiiza George, that the system will charge up to 3, but only 3, cell phones at one time.

All the funds for this endeavour have come from three sources. These are team members of the Uganda Wildife Rotation at the Western College of Veterianry Medicine, alumni of our program, Veterinarians Without Borders / Veterinaires Sans Frontieres (Canada) and generous corporate donors, of which more in future posts.

The best thing is that the installation will take place while we are in the park in mid-February. We will make sure that the community local council will be represented, as well as the park authorities and of course the children and staff.

Of course the solar stuff will not be of any use without the TV & deck, and today Jo & I did some sleuthing and found the ideal set. We had taken pre-emptive action and have some conservation videos to take and give to the school.

Hopefully we may have found a decent Internet connection by then and will post a picture two

Guard Dogs and penguins

Another encouraging story about guard dogs and wildlife, once more reaching me through the Wildlife Disease Network a blog I regularly scan here. In this case the protected animals are about as far from what one might imagine as possible. They are fairy penguins! These are the smallest penguins on earth, and nest in burrows close to shore. They are also known as little penguins, but the fairy name is more attractive, at least to me.

In an intriguing report from Australia published on-line in the Earth Times of Jan 5th that you can find here comes this report. For those who want a précis here is mine.

Guard dogs, in this case Maremmas sheep dogs from Italy, that bond to their charges just like the Anatolian and Pyrenees that I mentioned a few days ago on this blog, have been introduced to a small south-coast Australian island called Middle Island. The results have been very positive, and the population of penguins, which had declined (crashed?) from an original 5000 to 100 four years ago has crept back up to 180. Twenty-six chicks were counted in one night according to project manager Ian Fitzgibbons.

There are no pictures of either the penguins or the dogs in the report, so I have gone looking for them on the web and found a picture of the attractive dogs at here. They look very much like the Pyrenneans.




As for the penguins, here is what I found. The first one came straight form Google. The second picture (found here) looks very much like the ones we tried to take in Australia a few years ago. I fancy that the photographer was allowed to go much closer to the birds than we were, as ordinary tourists.

Bali Starling and Conservation

We have just returned from a wonderful holiday in Bali, Indonesia. Even there the issues of conservation surfaced with regularity, but the information is a bit confusing. The poster child for this island is the Bali starling Leucopsar rothschildi. We used two guide books, the ultra-famous Lonely Planets, and another called Eyewitness Travel, which has many more pictures of places and people than its more famous cousin, but not as much information. Then I checked the Internet after Googling the bird’s name – this is where I got the accompanying photo, posted on the Bali Bird park web site here . It is in this park that the birds a bred in a conservation program that may be one of the most important on the island.

Both books agree that the numbers of truly wild starlings, also known as Rothschild’s mynah are desperately low, perhaps as few a ten animals, or maybe none at all, all confined (if there) to the Taman Nasional Bali Barat park in the island’s western region. Lonely Planets spells it out after telling the reader about release attempts from the pre-release centre in the national park. “

This proved impossible. Despite heroic efforts by some staff members, birds were often killed by predatory falcons, while countless other were stolen from the centre by armed thieves.

” The “armed thieves” bit is what caught my eye. The reasons for the theft is not hard to seek. Birds, according to Lonely Plants, can fetch USD $700 each.

Gorillas, Conservation and Trouble in Paradise

One of the very best sources of news about conservation and wildlife issues cannot be considered a mainstream source of such information, but it is very much a mainstream source of world news. It is the BBC news web site that you can find here.

Within the site it is easy to navigate to almost anywhere in the world, and two recent reports caught my eye.

The first is a well-edited film clip, is titled Turmoil Troubles Masai Reserve and its subheading reads “Kenya's tourism slump after the recent political violence is threatening the Masai Mara game reserve.” You can find the footage here.

It opens with a shot of a small group of elephants walking across the grassy plain but quickly shifts to an interview with a Maasai community leader who tells of his struggles to look after his family in the face of collapsing tourist industry income. The original post was made in March this year, and I do not have the most recent information about any recovery. Maybe a reader has more to tell us. Let’s hope it is less pessimistic than the clip.



My own shots from the Mara bring back happy memories of several visits.

The second BBC item can be found by going directly to at this URL, or accessed through the gorilla wildlifedirect spot of the blog here about the desperately difficult situation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the park rangers who try to protect the Virunga area. They concentrate on two closely related things, gorillas and charcoal.

It is headed Diary: Protecting Mountain Gorillas and the sub reads “Two rangers share their experiences of protecting mountain gorillas in Virunga National Park, DR Congo".

The most recent post on the direct blog tells of a horror story in a troubled land. The heading reads Ranger Shot 12 Times and Killed in Virunga by Rebels. Over to you.

On the lighter side, for a bit of what she titles “Tee hee hee” humour about my own blog series you can go to writer, director, actor and television host (not to mention award winner) Nicole Stamp’s blog.